UNNAMED DAD. No word as to what happened to this boy's mother.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-mountie-wife-continue-trial-on-severe-child-abuse-1.3226475
Ottawa Mountie, wife continue trial on severe child abuse
WARNING: Story contains graphic and disturbing details
CBC News Posted: Sep 13, 2015 4:47 PM ET
Last Updated: Sep 14, 2015 7:26 PM ET
An Ottawa Mountie and his wife were arrested in 2013 in what police called the "worst case of abuse police have seen."
An Ottawa woman told police "I haven't done anything" after she and her RCMP officer husband were accused of severe long-term abuse of the man's 11-year-old son, including chaining him up in the basement of their home, court heard Monday.
The woman, 36, and man, 44, are on trial for what Ottawa police called the "worst case of abuse police have seen" when they were arrested in February 2013. They cannot be named to protect the boy's identity.
Each is on trial for aggravated assault, forcible confinement and failing to provide the necessaries of life.
The woman is also charged with assaulting the child with a weapon, while the man is charged with sexual assault causing bodily harm and assault with a weapon.
On Monday, court saw the woman's police interview via video, which was taken after her arrest. She told police her 11-year-old stepson was "out of control" and that she feared for the safety of her toddler and four-month-old baby.
She said she never hit the boy nor was she aware of his many injuries, including burn marks near his genitals, scabs and scars on his body and that he was gaunt and malnourished.
At one point, Ottawa Police Sgt. Tracy Butler told her in a raised voice the boy was "maltreated and abused by your husband."
She added, "you knew about it, you condoned it and you let it happen."
The woman, who was at times emotional during the interview, said, "I haven't done anything. I swear to God."
Father admitted to confining son
During the interview, which lasted more than two hours, the woman told police her stepson was stealing and getting into fights.
She said he was sent to private school after being kicked out of school, but the boy began being home schooled in 2012.
She said the boy was diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and oppositional defiant disorder and prescribed anti-psychotic medication.
She also said she worried he had sexual feelings for her after he asked her to breastfeed him.
"(He) didn't attach to me. I love him but it was difficult to reach out to him when he's mocking me all the time," she said.
She also said he told his father he would "initiate sexual things with other boys" at school and camp.
Last week, the court heard the man admit he used a chain and plastic ties to confine his son in the family's Kanata basement in his police interview video.
In 2013, the RCMP said the father has been on leave since May 2011, but the reason for that remains under a court-ordered publication ban.
Police sources previously told CBC News the man was a member of the force's counter-terrorism unit.
The trial continues.
Showing posts with label ADD. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ADD. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Dad admits he slammed and threw 2-month-old daughter; blames his ADD (Malone, New York)
His ADD made him do it? These guys sure come up with lots of excuses for their violence.
Dad is identified as JAMES J. WHITNEY.
http://www.pressrepublican.com/news/local_news/malone-father-admits-to-child-assault/article_242eddcc-b057-5579-bfe7-76f373447d4e.html
Malone father admits to child assault
Posted: Monday, November 10, 2014 2:42 pm
Denise A. Raymo, Press-Republican
MALONE — A Malone man pleaded guilty Monday to assaulting his infant daughter and will be sentenced in Franklin County Court on Jan. 26.
James J. Whitney, 29, admitted to reckless assault of a child and confessed that, while she was in his care on Dec. 29, 2013, he slammed and threw the baby girl, then 2 months old, so that her head hit a hard surface.
Jaycie Whitney, who celebrated her first birthday on Halloween, reportedly has some developmental issues as a result of her father’s violence.
He could face up to six years in state prison for the violent-felony conviction.
Whitney was deemed competent to stand trial last month during a hearing held before County Court Judge Robert G. Main Jr.
The defense, headed by Public Defender Thomas Soucia, had claimed Whitney could not fully participate in his defense at trial because he has attention-deficit disorder, heightened anxiety levels and trouble understanding the more complicated words police investigators and mental-health experts used when interviewing him.
Prosecution witnesses said Whitney would have likely been under great stress while on trial, but that would not have caused him irreparable mental harm.
Main agreed, saying accommodations could be made to reduce the anticipated stress.
Dad is identified as JAMES J. WHITNEY.
http://www.pressrepublican.com/news/local_news/malone-father-admits-to-child-assault/article_242eddcc-b057-5579-bfe7-76f373447d4e.html
Malone father admits to child assault
Posted: Monday, November 10, 2014 2:42 pm
Denise A. Raymo, Press-Republican
MALONE — A Malone man pleaded guilty Monday to assaulting his infant daughter and will be sentenced in Franklin County Court on Jan. 26.
James J. Whitney, 29, admitted to reckless assault of a child and confessed that, while she was in his care on Dec. 29, 2013, he slammed and threw the baby girl, then 2 months old, so that her head hit a hard surface.
Jaycie Whitney, who celebrated her first birthday on Halloween, reportedly has some developmental issues as a result of her father’s violence.
He could face up to six years in state prison for the violent-felony conviction.
Whitney was deemed competent to stand trial last month during a hearing held before County Court Judge Robert G. Main Jr.
The defense, headed by Public Defender Thomas Soucia, had claimed Whitney could not fully participate in his defense at trial because he has attention-deficit disorder, heightened anxiety levels and trouble understanding the more complicated words police investigators and mental-health experts used when interviewing him.
Prosecution witnesses said Whitney would have likely been under great stress while on trial, but that would not have caused him irreparable mental harm.
Main agreed, saying accommodations could be made to reduce the anticipated stress.
Friday, September 26, 2014
"Doting dad" convicted of 1st-degree murder of 10-week-old son; admits he repeatedly "bounced" baby on this head (Muskegon, Michigan)
Once again we see that behind every killer dad is an enabler who claims he's a "doting" dad, and nothing was EVER Daddy's fault. Nope, it was his ADD and learning disabilities. It was his reading problems! Next we'll hear how it was his halitosis or the heartbreak of psoriasis.
Fortunately, the jury didn't buy this bullsh**.
Dad is identified as ANTHONY CASANOVA.
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2014/09/dad_convicted_of_first-degree.html
Dad convicted of first-degree murder in death of baby boy in Muskegon County
By John S. Hausman on September 25, 2014 at 6:10 PM, updated September 25, 2014 at 6:11 PM
MUSKEGON, MI – In the end, it was a swift verdict for Anthony Casanova: Guilty of first-degree murder in the death of his 10-week-old son Tyler.
Jurors were out barely 45 minutes before coming back with that maximum verdict.
Casanova, his face somber as he stood at the defense table next to Muskegon County Public Defender Fred Johnson, showed no change of expression when the verdict was read just before 4:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 25.
But his mother, Darlene Thomas, who testified in his defense earlier in the day, wept audibly in the audience.
Jurors had four possible verdicts to choose from: Not guilty, or guilty of first-degree felony murder, second-degree murder or manslaughter. They chose the top charge.
All jurors declined to comment as they left the jury room after the verdict.
The mandatory sentence is life in prison without chance of parole. Muskegon County 14th Circuit Chief Judge William C. Marietti scheduled sentencing for 9:15 a.m. Oct. 27.
Johnson said Casanova will appeal the verdict.
"We're pleased, obviously, that Tyler got the justice that he so deserved, and I look forward to his killer being sentenced for the rest of his life in prison," Muskegon County Prosecutor D.J. Hilson said. Hilson, the county's elected prosecutor, handled the case personally from the start.
The jury of six women and six men began deliberating shortly after 3:35 p.m. Sept. 25 and reported they had a verdict before 4:25 p.m. Anthony Casanova was convicted of first degree murder in the death of his 10-week-old son Tyler Casanova on January 4, 2013.
In closing arguments to jurors Thursday afternoon, Hilson and Johnson summed up their cases.
Johnson acknowledged the damage done to the defense by a video of Casanova's interview with a police detective – in which Casanova eventually said he repeatedly "bounced" the baby down head-first on an inflated air mattress and twice squeezed him until his breath stopped -- and testimony by Muskegon County's medical examiner that Tyler's injuries were not consistent with Casanova's original story that he had accidentally fallen on the baby after tripping over his dog.
"That was devastating for the defense," Johnson said of the video. "You heard it, you saw it... And then you heard the medical examiner this morning, and that too was devastating for the defense. I'm not going to try to pull you away from that."
In his closing argument, Johnson never mentioned the dog story, which he put forward as the truth in his opening statement Sept. 23.
Instead, he seemed to be arguing for a compromise verdict – a conviction not of first-degree felony murder, as the prosecution asked, but something less, such as manslaughter or second-degree murder.
Johnson focused on intent. He noted multiple witnesses who testified Casanova loved his children and was good with them.
"The step was made over the line. ... But it wasn't intentional," Johnson said. "What father intends to kill his child?"
Hilson argued for conviction of the maximum possible charge: first-degree felony murder, meaning murder done while committing the felony of first-degree child abuse.
"This is not a manslaughter case," Hilson said.
"You don't get to kill your kid and say you lost it. No way. No way. This man intentionally inflicted these injuries on a defenseless 2-month-old child," Hilson said. "Don't compromise. Find him guilty of felony murder."
Hilson told jurors that, even if they didn't find proof that Casanova intended to kill or do great bodily harm to his son, they must still find him guilty of murder if he "showed a willful and wanton disregard of the likelihood that the natural tendency of his conduct is to cause death or great bodily harm."
Also Thursday afternoon, Tyler's maternal grandmother, Joyce Wagner, the defendant's younger brother Mark Thomas and a day-care provider, Robin Carpenter, all testified they saw nothing abnormal about Tyler when they saw him days before his death.
Earlier Sept. 25, Casanova wept as his mother emotionally told jurors her beliefs about how kind he is, how good with small children, and how prone to be a "people pleaser" who will tell people what they want to hear when he's under pressure.
"You don't get to kill your kid and say you lost it. No way. No way. This man intentionally inflicted these injuries on a defenseless 2-month-old child."
Muskegon County Prosecutor D.J. Hilson
But jurors also heard testimony from Muskegon County's medical examiner, a highly experienced forensic pathologist, that Casanova's baby son's injuries were not consistent with the story Casanova initially told investigators.
Casanova, 41, was convicted of killing Tyler on Jan. 4, 2013. At first he said he tripped over his dog while holding the baby and fell on him, but later during a long police interview said he had "bounced" the crying baby seven or eight times on an inflated air mattress and squeezed him twice in a "bear hug."
Casanova's mother, Darlene Thomas, was the first defense witness. She said her son had learning disabilities, including attention deficit disorder and reading problems.
She said those and a "people pleasing" personality make him prone to tell people what they want to hear when he's under pressure, even if it's a false confession.
Thomas also said Casanova loves children and is a doting father. He and his ex-wife adopted twin special-needs infants who were 2 when Tyler died. She said he had been told he couldn't have biological children and was overjoyed when he learned his girlfriend, Julia Striker, was pregnant with Tyler.
Thomas lives in another state and said she had not seen Casanova after Tyler was born, but that Casanova constantly texted her photographs of Tyler and his adopted children.
Casanova became visibly emotional as his mother testified, wiping his eyes repeatedly and openly crying at some points. Thomas herself wept for several minutes after Johnson was done questioning her and before Hilson began his cross-examination.
Injuries inconsistent with explanation
Earlier Thursday morning, Dr. Joyce deJong, Muskegon County medical examiner, testified for the prosecution about her examination and autopsy of Tyler on Jan. 5, 2013, the day after he died.
She described extensive injuries, including a skull fracture, bleeding between the skull and the brain, bleeding behind the eyes, and bruises, some partially healed, on Tyler's chin, chest and abdomen. The bruises on his body were the size of fingertips – some 25 of them, she said. She said Tyler also had numerous partially healed rib fractures, a lacerated liver, bleeding inside his spleen and a bruised heart.
Her medical conclusion: His death was a homicide caused by "multiple injuries intentionally inflicted by another."
She said the injuries were not consistent with Casanova's original story of accidentally falling on Tyler, crushing him.
Under cross-examination by Johnson, deJong said that even if the older, healing injuries were disregarded, even the fatal head injury alone was not consistent with being crushed by another object. That's because bleeding inside the skull, caused by tearing of tiny veins, is consistent only with a "motion injury," with the baby striking another object while moving.
She also said the bruises on Tyler's body were not consistent with a panicked, untrained person trying to revive a baby using CPR.
Norton Shores Police Detective Lori Sinclair also testified for the prosecution.
Sinclair said she checked the air mattress on which Casanova said he had repeatedly bounced Tyler while sitting on the edge. She said, when compressed, the mattress was very firm, much firmer than an ordinary mattress.
Fortunately, the jury didn't buy this bullsh**.
Dad is identified as ANTHONY CASANOVA.
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2014/09/dad_convicted_of_first-degree.html
Dad convicted of first-degree murder in death of baby boy in Muskegon County
By John S. Hausman on September 25, 2014 at 6:10 PM, updated September 25, 2014 at 6:11 PM
MUSKEGON, MI – In the end, it was a swift verdict for Anthony Casanova: Guilty of first-degree murder in the death of his 10-week-old son Tyler.
Jurors were out barely 45 minutes before coming back with that maximum verdict.
Casanova, his face somber as he stood at the defense table next to Muskegon County Public Defender Fred Johnson, showed no change of expression when the verdict was read just before 4:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 25.
But his mother, Darlene Thomas, who testified in his defense earlier in the day, wept audibly in the audience.
Jurors had four possible verdicts to choose from: Not guilty, or guilty of first-degree felony murder, second-degree murder or manslaughter. They chose the top charge.
All jurors declined to comment as they left the jury room after the verdict.
The mandatory sentence is life in prison without chance of parole. Muskegon County 14th Circuit Chief Judge William C. Marietti scheduled sentencing for 9:15 a.m. Oct. 27.
Johnson said Casanova will appeal the verdict.
"We're pleased, obviously, that Tyler got the justice that he so deserved, and I look forward to his killer being sentenced for the rest of his life in prison," Muskegon County Prosecutor D.J. Hilson said. Hilson, the county's elected prosecutor, handled the case personally from the start.
The jury of six women and six men began deliberating shortly after 3:35 p.m. Sept. 25 and reported they had a verdict before 4:25 p.m. Anthony Casanova was convicted of first degree murder in the death of his 10-week-old son Tyler Casanova on January 4, 2013.
In closing arguments to jurors Thursday afternoon, Hilson and Johnson summed up their cases.
Johnson acknowledged the damage done to the defense by a video of Casanova's interview with a police detective – in which Casanova eventually said he repeatedly "bounced" the baby down head-first on an inflated air mattress and twice squeezed him until his breath stopped -- and testimony by Muskegon County's medical examiner that Tyler's injuries were not consistent with Casanova's original story that he had accidentally fallen on the baby after tripping over his dog.
"That was devastating for the defense," Johnson said of the video. "You heard it, you saw it... And then you heard the medical examiner this morning, and that too was devastating for the defense. I'm not going to try to pull you away from that."
In his closing argument, Johnson never mentioned the dog story, which he put forward as the truth in his opening statement Sept. 23.
Instead, he seemed to be arguing for a compromise verdict – a conviction not of first-degree felony murder, as the prosecution asked, but something less, such as manslaughter or second-degree murder.
Johnson focused on intent. He noted multiple witnesses who testified Casanova loved his children and was good with them.
"The step was made over the line. ... But it wasn't intentional," Johnson said. "What father intends to kill his child?"
Hilson argued for conviction of the maximum possible charge: first-degree felony murder, meaning murder done while committing the felony of first-degree child abuse.
"This is not a manslaughter case," Hilson said.
"You don't get to kill your kid and say you lost it. No way. No way. This man intentionally inflicted these injuries on a defenseless 2-month-old child," Hilson said. "Don't compromise. Find him guilty of felony murder."
Hilson told jurors that, even if they didn't find proof that Casanova intended to kill or do great bodily harm to his son, they must still find him guilty of murder if he "showed a willful and wanton disregard of the likelihood that the natural tendency of his conduct is to cause death or great bodily harm."
Also Thursday afternoon, Tyler's maternal grandmother, Joyce Wagner, the defendant's younger brother Mark Thomas and a day-care provider, Robin Carpenter, all testified they saw nothing abnormal about Tyler when they saw him days before his death.
Earlier Sept. 25, Casanova wept as his mother emotionally told jurors her beliefs about how kind he is, how good with small children, and how prone to be a "people pleaser" who will tell people what they want to hear when he's under pressure.
"You don't get to kill your kid and say you lost it. No way. No way. This man intentionally inflicted these injuries on a defenseless 2-month-old child."
Muskegon County Prosecutor D.J. Hilson
But jurors also heard testimony from Muskegon County's medical examiner, a highly experienced forensic pathologist, that Casanova's baby son's injuries were not consistent with the story Casanova initially told investigators.
Casanova, 41, was convicted of killing Tyler on Jan. 4, 2013. At first he said he tripped over his dog while holding the baby and fell on him, but later during a long police interview said he had "bounced" the crying baby seven or eight times on an inflated air mattress and squeezed him twice in a "bear hug."
Casanova's mother, Darlene Thomas, was the first defense witness. She said her son had learning disabilities, including attention deficit disorder and reading problems.
She said those and a "people pleasing" personality make him prone to tell people what they want to hear when he's under pressure, even if it's a false confession.
Thomas also said Casanova loves children and is a doting father. He and his ex-wife adopted twin special-needs infants who were 2 when Tyler died. She said he had been told he couldn't have biological children and was overjoyed when he learned his girlfriend, Julia Striker, was pregnant with Tyler.
Thomas lives in another state and said she had not seen Casanova after Tyler was born, but that Casanova constantly texted her photographs of Tyler and his adopted children.
Casanova became visibly emotional as his mother testified, wiping his eyes repeatedly and openly crying at some points. Thomas herself wept for several minutes after Johnson was done questioning her and before Hilson began his cross-examination.
Injuries inconsistent with explanation
Earlier Thursday morning, Dr. Joyce deJong, Muskegon County medical examiner, testified for the prosecution about her examination and autopsy of Tyler on Jan. 5, 2013, the day after he died.
She described extensive injuries, including a skull fracture, bleeding between the skull and the brain, bleeding behind the eyes, and bruises, some partially healed, on Tyler's chin, chest and abdomen. The bruises on his body were the size of fingertips – some 25 of them, she said. She said Tyler also had numerous partially healed rib fractures, a lacerated liver, bleeding inside his spleen and a bruised heart.
Her medical conclusion: His death was a homicide caused by "multiple injuries intentionally inflicted by another."
She said the injuries were not consistent with Casanova's original story of accidentally falling on Tyler, crushing him.
Under cross-examination by Johnson, deJong said that even if the older, healing injuries were disregarded, even the fatal head injury alone was not consistent with being crushed by another object. That's because bleeding inside the skull, caused by tearing of tiny veins, is consistent only with a "motion injury," with the baby striking another object while moving.
She also said the bruises on Tyler's body were not consistent with a panicked, untrained person trying to revive a baby using CPR.
Norton Shores Police Detective Lori Sinclair also testified for the prosecution.
Sinclair said she checked the air mattress on which Casanova said he had repeatedly bounced Tyler while sitting on the edge. She said, when compressed, the mattress was very firm, much firmer than an ordinary mattress.
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Dad charged with attempted murder in poisoning of 4-month-old daughter (Queensland, Australia)
I understand that Daddy has his family enablers--these guys always have the suck-ups on their side. But even the disability advocates are behind this little sh** who tortured this baby with powerful drugs? Disgusting. UNNAMED DAD.
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/teen-dad-accused-of-poisoning-his-fourmonthold-daughter-20130829-2ssd9.html
Teen dad accused of poisoning his four-month-old daughter
August 29, 2013 - 1:25PM
A Queensland father poisoned his baby daughter with anti-psychotic drugs and forced her to swallow a 10 cent coin, police allege.
The 19-year-old unemployed man, who cannot be named, has been charged with attempted murder and was granted bail in Brisbane Magistrates Court on Thursday.
Police said his partner woke late on August 13 to find the couple’s four-month-old daughter struggling to breathe.
She had turned blue and was ‘‘pale and floppy’’ with a temperature of just 34 degrees, according to an affidavit tendered in court.
The infant was taken to hospital from the family’s Morayfield house, north of Brisbane, just after midnight.
Hospital staff noted she had a high heart rate and would scream in bouts.
A urine test found the antipsychotic pericyazine and the attention deficit disorder drug methylphenidate.
The father was on both drugs and suffered attention deficit disorder, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
In hospital the infant vomited up a 10 cent piece, which doctors said she could not have ingested accidentally because she lacked the motor skills.
A day earlier the father had asked his partner and her parents what would happen if the child swallowed a coin and was told she would die.
He had an argument with his partner the night of the incident and had been the last to feed the baby around 11.30pm, according to the affidavit.
Police opposed bail, saying the man had a propensity for violence and was a risk to himself and others.
Legal Aid lawyer Rhianna Batt said he had mental health issues but no significant criminal history that indicated a risk.
She said he had the support of his mother, two sisters and disability advocates, who were all in court.
Magistrate Judy Daley said she was comforted by the man’s support network and did not believe he was a flight risk.
She granted bail on the condition he have no contact with his daughter or partner and that he would stay away from the Morayfield address.
The man has also been charged with use of a controlled drug, possession and stealing.
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/teen-dad-accused-of-poisoning-his-fourmonthold-daughter-20130829-2ssd9.html
Teen dad accused of poisoning his four-month-old daughter
August 29, 2013 - 1:25PM
A Queensland father poisoned his baby daughter with anti-psychotic drugs and forced her to swallow a 10 cent coin, police allege.
The 19-year-old unemployed man, who cannot be named, has been charged with attempted murder and was granted bail in Brisbane Magistrates Court on Thursday.
Police said his partner woke late on August 13 to find the couple’s four-month-old daughter struggling to breathe.
She had turned blue and was ‘‘pale and floppy’’ with a temperature of just 34 degrees, according to an affidavit tendered in court.
The infant was taken to hospital from the family’s Morayfield house, north of Brisbane, just after midnight.
Hospital staff noted she had a high heart rate and would scream in bouts.
A urine test found the antipsychotic pericyazine and the attention deficit disorder drug methylphenidate.
The father was on both drugs and suffered attention deficit disorder, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
In hospital the infant vomited up a 10 cent piece, which doctors said she could not have ingested accidentally because she lacked the motor skills.
A day earlier the father had asked his partner and her parents what would happen if the child swallowed a coin and was told she would die.
He had an argument with his partner the night of the incident and had been the last to feed the baby around 11.30pm, according to the affidavit.
Police opposed bail, saying the man had a propensity for violence and was a risk to himself and others.
Legal Aid lawyer Rhianna Batt said he had mental health issues but no significant criminal history that indicated a risk.
She said he had the support of his mother, two sisters and disability advocates, who were all in court.
Magistrate Judy Daley said she was comforted by the man’s support network and did not believe he was a flight risk.
She granted bail on the condition he have no contact with his daughter or partner and that he would stay away from the Morayfield address.
The man has also been charged with use of a controlled drug, possession and stealing.
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Dad pleads guilty to assaulting son; beat boy with electrical cord (Hamlin Heights, Australia)
Is UNNAMED DAD a single father? Notice that while there is mention of DHS involvement, there is no mention of a mother in the home or anywhere else. What happened to this boy's mom?
Also notice that this abusive father still had unrestricted weekend visitation. Typical father fawning.
http://www.geelongadvertiser.com.au/article/2013/07/20/369640_news.html
Dad whipped son with electrical cord
Anthea Cannon | July 20th, 2013
A HAMLYN Heights father crossed the line when he whipped his son with an electrical cord and smacked him, a Geelong magistrate has ruled.
The father of two pleaded guilty to assault charges yesterday after his son reported three incidents to police and was placed in Department of Human Services' care.
Police Prosecutor Leading Senior Constable Geoff Lamb said between March 11 and 16 this year, the two argued and the father used the cord of a CD player to whip the boy's forearm, smacked him twice on his bottom and grabbed him by his shirt and threw him against a wall.
Sen-Constable Lamb said the father told police he had been "kicking himself" about the incidents and did not realise his own strength.
Eleven photos of the boy's welts and bruising were presented in court.
Defence lawyer Domenic Care said his client cried after one of the incidents and knew it was no way to treat a child.
Mr Care told the court the boy had Attention Deficit Disorder and had been in trouble at school when the father sat down to speak to him about it.
He said despite being in DHS care, the son was allowed overnight and weekend stays and wanted to come home permanently.
"My client is otherwise of exceptional character," Mr Care said.
Magistrate Stephen Myall requested the DHS hearing orders which will see the father's parenting "tested and assessed" for the next 26 weeks, working towards reunification.
"These are difficult cases and important prosecutions," he said. "Parents are required to do no more than lawfully correct. You were taking steps to correct (behaviour) but they were not responsible and not moderate.
"I do accept you are remorseful and (it has been) a traumatic and difficult experience. You brought the matter to police attention because (your son) left home."
Mr Myall said he gave "anxious consideration" to whether to impose a conviction, which would jeopardise the father's job, but because of the DHS plan, the guilty plea and remorse he did not.
The father was ordered to pay $2000 to the court fund and placed on a good behaviour bond for two years.
Also notice that this abusive father still had unrestricted weekend visitation. Typical father fawning.
http://www.geelongadvertiser.com.au/article/2013/07/20/369640_news.html
Dad whipped son with electrical cord
Anthea Cannon | July 20th, 2013
A HAMLYN Heights father crossed the line when he whipped his son with an electrical cord and smacked him, a Geelong magistrate has ruled.
The father of two pleaded guilty to assault charges yesterday after his son reported three incidents to police and was placed in Department of Human Services' care.
Police Prosecutor Leading Senior Constable Geoff Lamb said between March 11 and 16 this year, the two argued and the father used the cord of a CD player to whip the boy's forearm, smacked him twice on his bottom and grabbed him by his shirt and threw him against a wall.
Sen-Constable Lamb said the father told police he had been "kicking himself" about the incidents and did not realise his own strength.
Eleven photos of the boy's welts and bruising were presented in court.
Defence lawyer Domenic Care said his client cried after one of the incidents and knew it was no way to treat a child.
Mr Care told the court the boy had Attention Deficit Disorder and had been in trouble at school when the father sat down to speak to him about it.
He said despite being in DHS care, the son was allowed overnight and weekend stays and wanted to come home permanently.
"My client is otherwise of exceptional character," Mr Care said.
Magistrate Stephen Myall requested the DHS hearing orders which will see the father's parenting "tested and assessed" for the next 26 weeks, working towards reunification.
"These are difficult cases and important prosecutions," he said. "Parents are required to do no more than lawfully correct. You were taking steps to correct (behaviour) but they were not responsible and not moderate.
"I do accept you are remorseful and (it has been) a traumatic and difficult experience. You brought the matter to police attention because (your son) left home."
Mr Myall said he gave "anxious consideration" to whether to impose a conviction, which would jeopardise the father's job, but because of the DHS plan, the guilty plea and remorse he did not.
The father was ordered to pay $2000 to the court fund and placed on a good behaviour bond for two years.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Custodial dad, step await trial for torture of son; once again, DCF "missed clues" (Charlotte County, Florida)
Stop the presses! Florida DCF screws up again, and allows a custodial dad (and new step) to abuse (torture) a child!
How many times have we read variations on this story, with almost no changes? I have counted 20 stories in Florida alone of children who died in situations involving custody/visitation with an abusive father. This poor little boy managed to avoid being added to the list only because he literally escaped from captivity, like some sort of prisoner of war.
http://www.news-press.com/article/20110301/SS08/110227018/Exclusive-DCF-missed-clues-Port-Charlotte-boy-s-captivity?odyssey=tab%7Ctopnews%7Ctext%7CHome
Exclusive: DCF missed clues of Port Charlotte boy's captivity
As father, stepmother await trial, questions linger for Florida agency
4:27 PM, Feb. 28, 2011
Written by
JANINE ZEITLIN
jzeitlin@news-press.com Filed Under
By the age of 10, the wiry boy had learned to live like a prisoner of war.
He told his grandmother he passed the months trapped in his room peering at the freedom of the night sky, craning to hear his stepsister’s TV and plotting his escape.
Charlotte County sheriff’s reports paint a disturbing picture of the towheaded boy’s room in a quiet, middle-class Port Charlotte neighborhood:
No toys or lights. No furniture except for a urine-soaked mattress. The lock on his door reversed.
His petite 40-year-old stepmother, Kimberly Boone, told detectives she had smeared feces and urine in his face, “like you would a dog,” and slid peanut butter sandwiches under his door so she wouldn’t have to see him.
It’s been eight months since a crime scene technician found the boy asleep in a bathroom vanity and took him from the home.
But his exit could have come much earlier.
The boy was seen by a slew of child welfare, school, medical and mental health officials and law enforcement officers long before the arrests of his stepmother and father, Thomas Boone, according to records The News-Press obtained.
A Department of Children and Families investigator first visited the home and saw the room in early December.
The agency’s internal review shows the case was bungled. The case has played a role in changes to local DCF policies.
The child is not being named because of the nature of the allegations.
“It’s just unbelievable how many people erred in this,” said Mary Kaiser, his 70-year-old grandmother who has been caring for the boy in her south Fort Myers condo. “Somebody needs to be responsible.”
The background
Three abuse reports were made to DCF starting in December 2009.
The child’s pleas for another place to live went unheeded, records show. He begged DCF investigator Gordon Smith in January for another place to live because he “needed a break,” and drew a picture at school of a gun with bullets going into his head, records show.
The department’s quality assurance review of the case was acquired through a public-records request but all other DCF records are confidential.
Smith left the boy in the home after seeing the room with the mattress and reversed doorknob, records say.
He wouldn’t say why he left him there.
“I really can’t go into that right now because it’s part of the criminal case and I’m being deposed,” he said.
Smith interviewed the parents and the boy, often alone, at least six times and made at least three visits to the home, the review shows. Smith said conditions had spiraled downhill from the time he first saw him to June.
“People don’t know the whole story, and that’s not to say that mistakes weren’t made,” said Smith, 63, of Port Charlotte, who earned $1,507 biweekly and officially retired Dec. 30, 2010.
Smith said the case played no role in his retirement. He was hired by DCF in 2004 after 26 years of police work.
He said he often thinks about the boy, who “was the one who suffered because of it.”
Boy sneaks out
It wasn’t until law enforcement showed up June 19, 2010, after his father called to report him missing, that the boy found a way out.
That day, the grandmother said, the roughly 50-pound boy sneaked out to hunt for food in the master bedroom.
Kimberly and Thomas Boone, 39, spent little time in jail after posting $12,500 bond each, court records show. DCF later placed the boy with his grandmother.
On Thursday, a Charlotte magistrate terminated DCF’s supervision.
His stepmother and father are awaiting trial on two felony child abuse charges each, including one for malicious punishment and/or torture, and a felony child neglect charge.
Neither responded to requests for comment. They are being represented by attorneys paid for by tax dollars. Both have filed pleas of not guilty.
Kaiser plans to relocate with the boy to Tennessee to be with family and away from the attention that will follow from the criminal case.
Kaiser, who calls her son’s alleged actions uncharacteristic, tried to isolate her grandson from the media frenzy after the arrests, but he overheard his father’s name on TV.
“‘Now people will believe me, and now Gordon Smith will believe me,’” Boone recalled her grandson saying.
Amen, she said, and pulled him close for a hug.
The DCF report
DCF’s report outlines several shortcomings.
It concluded Smith failed to gauge the risk to the child, especially given Kimberly Boone’s past and the couple’s admission they confined him for long periods to punish him.
The couple married in 2009, the report says, and conditions changed for the boy. His birth mother has not been in the child’s life since he was a baby, his grandmother said.
Kimberly Boone’s teen children had been removed because of broken bones of her then-infant son, the report says.
It’s not clear in the review when the injuries occurred, but the incident was noted in a DCF report the year before the couple married. Kimberly Boone’s history with the child welfare system began in 1996 after an allegation of physical abuse, it says.
Smith said he had social services come to the home to provide such things as counseling. He blamed the system’s bureaucracy for a communication gap.
“If you don’t hear anything back from the services, you assume everything is OK, and that’s the problem,” he said. “I was relying on other people to tell me what was going on.”
Lutheran Services Florida is subcontracted to handle such services.
Among other failings listed in the report: Smith neglected to question explanations for documented scratches on the boy’s neck and thoroughly investigate a head injury.
He failed to take the boy for mandatory interviews with a child protection team and asked for an exception to the process that would have brought an independent opinion.
“The child continually expressed fear of his stepmother and stated he was afraid to be alone with her,” the quality assurance report says.
Smith said the Boones wanted help but the agency doesn’t have money to deliver services, only make judgments.
“If I’m knocking on the door and saying, ‘I’m from the government and I can help,’ I better be able to back that up,” Smith said. “I didn’t find that in this case and in most cases.”
It initially seemed the family could be kept together, which is often best for the child if he is safe, said Cookie Coleman, who leads DCF in Southwest Florida.
Smith and his supervisor, Abby Duwe, were verbally reprimanded after the report, she said.
Their actions also were dissected before other supervisors for training purposes.
Kaiser believes that was not enough for Smith.
“That man should go to prison with the stepmother because I personally cried and called him until I’m sure if he knew I was calling he would never answer the phone,” she said.
Opinions differ
With all eyes on the family, how did the system not pluck the child from his home earlier?
The case was muddied by differing professional opinions and the child’s recanting of allegations, Coleman said, noting that is not uncommon for children to do.
“Unfortunately, the investigator was listening to that and not actually looking at the physical evidence and giving it the proper weight.”
Kaiser has been frustrated by the response. Child welfare officials have pointed to behavioral problems as a reason, she said.
The boy was taking medication for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, the DCF report says.
“Once DCF realized they had screwed up, they didn’t just say, ‘Wow we screwed up,’ but they just tried to keep covering it up,” Kaiser said.
Coleman said the way the case was handled factored into policy changes.
Investigators can no longer ask for an exception for a mandatory interview with a child protection team, she said, as Smith did for a second report of the stepmother grabbing the child’s neck in January.
“This pretty much gets another set of eyes on the case,” Coleman said.
The team is run by an organization independent of DCF, and conducts detailed interviews to try to ferret out the truth.
Smith asked for the exception because he said there were no signs of injury and the child recanted, the DCF review says.
The agency also will do deeper research into a family’s abuse history and look for patterns that stretch to the present, Coleman said.
Still, she said, the system is not failure proof.
“We are taking steps but unfortunately, we will continue to miss things,” she said. “We can always improve and we always need to improve.”
Signs of abuse
When the crime scene technician found the 10-year-old under the sink, he emerged looking scared and malnourished, say records that also provided this information:
The 10-year-old said his stepmother hit, scratched and threw him, along with forcing him to eat a piece of cloth with feces.
At times, he was made to stand in the corner with his arms up for days.
In the morning, he was allowed a slug of water and, at night, a peanut butter sandwich he sometimes hid under his mattress for when he was really hungry.
The boy told authorities he had been locked in his room since December, only leaving for school or when his family was gone.
The couple didn’t dispute much of what he said, according to reports. Kimberly Boone said she kept the door locked from 9 p.m. to the morning.
Thomas Boone told detectives his son could come out. Keeping him in the room was punishment for lying, he said.
The couple moved out of the white house with green trim after their arrests, said landlord Phillip Heyden.
The Boones told him the boy would run away at night, and they were in counseling.
“They seemed to be nice people, and it turned into a nightmare for them,” Heyden said.
His wish list
The evening the 10-year-old was removed, before going to bed in the cozy guest room of his grandmother’s condo, he scribbled out two lists.
Things he wanted to get included: “few bags of marshmellows, few boxes of gramcrackers.”
On his to-do list was: “roast marshmellows, go shoping ... go to the park for a few minuts, draw.”
He has asked to see his father, and told detectives he loved him, court records show. His father’s attorney has asked a no-contact order be lifted, which was denied.
The boy’s drawings no longer depict suicide; they feature airplanes. He recently told his grandmother he no longer thinks about his stepmother every day. That’s probably a good thing, she told him.
“There will be remnants of this forever, but he’s got a real capability for solving problems,” Kaiser said. “He’s like a little man in a 10-year-old body.”
How many times have we read variations on this story, with almost no changes? I have counted 20 stories in Florida alone of children who died in situations involving custody/visitation with an abusive father. This poor little boy managed to avoid being added to the list only because he literally escaped from captivity, like some sort of prisoner of war.
http://dastardlydads.blogspot.com/2011/02/175-killer-dads-fathers-who-ended-their.html
It is almost impossible to say how many children survive situations involving custody/visitation with a abusive father, but with the scars of physical, sexual, and/or emotional abuse or neglect. Notice that the mother's existence is at least acknowledged--no mysterious stork here for once--but we're only told she hasn't been around since the baby's birth.
Why? Was she homeless? Did she have drug or alcohol problems? Was she underage? It seems to me whatever her issues were--assuming she had issues--they weren't nearly as bad as Daddy's turned out to be, wouldn't you think? And that's assuming she DID in fact have issues. And notice that not one word is said here to document or even suggest that she did. It is also DISTINCTLY POSSIBLE that abuser daddy THOMAS BOONE simply outgunned her in court. The general public still does not understand that these kinds of torturers are often unrelenting in their pursuit of custody, and that they are obsessive in their desire to either "punish" the mother and/or secure a helpless victim for their rage.http://www.news-press.com/article/20110301/SS08/110227018/Exclusive-DCF-missed-clues-Port-Charlotte-boy-s-captivity?odyssey=tab%7Ctopnews%7Ctext%7CHome
Exclusive: DCF missed clues of Port Charlotte boy's captivity
As father, stepmother await trial, questions linger for Florida agency
4:27 PM, Feb. 28, 2011
Written by
JANINE ZEITLIN
jzeitlin@news-press.com Filed Under
By the age of 10, the wiry boy had learned to live like a prisoner of war.
He told his grandmother he passed the months trapped in his room peering at the freedom of the night sky, craning to hear his stepsister’s TV and plotting his escape.
Charlotte County sheriff’s reports paint a disturbing picture of the towheaded boy’s room in a quiet, middle-class Port Charlotte neighborhood:
No toys or lights. No furniture except for a urine-soaked mattress. The lock on his door reversed.
His petite 40-year-old stepmother, Kimberly Boone, told detectives she had smeared feces and urine in his face, “like you would a dog,” and slid peanut butter sandwiches under his door so she wouldn’t have to see him.
It’s been eight months since a crime scene technician found the boy asleep in a bathroom vanity and took him from the home.
But his exit could have come much earlier.
The boy was seen by a slew of child welfare, school, medical and mental health officials and law enforcement officers long before the arrests of his stepmother and father, Thomas Boone, according to records The News-Press obtained.
A Department of Children and Families investigator first visited the home and saw the room in early December.
The agency’s internal review shows the case was bungled. The case has played a role in changes to local DCF policies.
The child is not being named because of the nature of the allegations.
“It’s just unbelievable how many people erred in this,” said Mary Kaiser, his 70-year-old grandmother who has been caring for the boy in her south Fort Myers condo. “Somebody needs to be responsible.”
The background
Three abuse reports were made to DCF starting in December 2009.
The child’s pleas for another place to live went unheeded, records show. He begged DCF investigator Gordon Smith in January for another place to live because he “needed a break,” and drew a picture at school of a gun with bullets going into his head, records show.
The department’s quality assurance review of the case was acquired through a public-records request but all other DCF records are confidential.
Smith left the boy in the home after seeing the room with the mattress and reversed doorknob, records say.
He wouldn’t say why he left him there.
“I really can’t go into that right now because it’s part of the criminal case and I’m being deposed,” he said.
Smith interviewed the parents and the boy, often alone, at least six times and made at least three visits to the home, the review shows. Smith said conditions had spiraled downhill from the time he first saw him to June.
“People don’t know the whole story, and that’s not to say that mistakes weren’t made,” said Smith, 63, of Port Charlotte, who earned $1,507 biweekly and officially retired Dec. 30, 2010.
Smith said the case played no role in his retirement. He was hired by DCF in 2004 after 26 years of police work.
He said he often thinks about the boy, who “was the one who suffered because of it.”
Boy sneaks out
It wasn’t until law enforcement showed up June 19, 2010, after his father called to report him missing, that the boy found a way out.
That day, the grandmother said, the roughly 50-pound boy sneaked out to hunt for food in the master bedroom.
Kimberly and Thomas Boone, 39, spent little time in jail after posting $12,500 bond each, court records show. DCF later placed the boy with his grandmother.
On Thursday, a Charlotte magistrate terminated DCF’s supervision.
His stepmother and father are awaiting trial on two felony child abuse charges each, including one for malicious punishment and/or torture, and a felony child neglect charge.
Neither responded to requests for comment. They are being represented by attorneys paid for by tax dollars. Both have filed pleas of not guilty.
Kaiser plans to relocate with the boy to Tennessee to be with family and away from the attention that will follow from the criminal case.
Kaiser, who calls her son’s alleged actions uncharacteristic, tried to isolate her grandson from the media frenzy after the arrests, but he overheard his father’s name on TV.
“‘Now people will believe me, and now Gordon Smith will believe me,’” Boone recalled her grandson saying.
Amen, she said, and pulled him close for a hug.
The DCF report
DCF’s report outlines several shortcomings.
It concluded Smith failed to gauge the risk to the child, especially given Kimberly Boone’s past and the couple’s admission they confined him for long periods to punish him.
The couple married in 2009, the report says, and conditions changed for the boy. His birth mother has not been in the child’s life since he was a baby, his grandmother said.
Kimberly Boone’s teen children had been removed because of broken bones of her then-infant son, the report says.
It’s not clear in the review when the injuries occurred, but the incident was noted in a DCF report the year before the couple married. Kimberly Boone’s history with the child welfare system began in 1996 after an allegation of physical abuse, it says.
Smith said he had social services come to the home to provide such things as counseling. He blamed the system’s bureaucracy for a communication gap.
“If you don’t hear anything back from the services, you assume everything is OK, and that’s the problem,” he said. “I was relying on other people to tell me what was going on.”
Lutheran Services Florida is subcontracted to handle such services.
Among other failings listed in the report: Smith neglected to question explanations for documented scratches on the boy’s neck and thoroughly investigate a head injury.
He failed to take the boy for mandatory interviews with a child protection team and asked for an exception to the process that would have brought an independent opinion.
“The child continually expressed fear of his stepmother and stated he was afraid to be alone with her,” the quality assurance report says.
Smith said the Boones wanted help but the agency doesn’t have money to deliver services, only make judgments.
“If I’m knocking on the door and saying, ‘I’m from the government and I can help,’ I better be able to back that up,” Smith said. “I didn’t find that in this case and in most cases.”
It initially seemed the family could be kept together, which is often best for the child if he is safe, said Cookie Coleman, who leads DCF in Southwest Florida.
Smith and his supervisor, Abby Duwe, were verbally reprimanded after the report, she said.
Their actions also were dissected before other supervisors for training purposes.
Kaiser believes that was not enough for Smith.
“That man should go to prison with the stepmother because I personally cried and called him until I’m sure if he knew I was calling he would never answer the phone,” she said.
Opinions differ
With all eyes on the family, how did the system not pluck the child from his home earlier?
The case was muddied by differing professional opinions and the child’s recanting of allegations, Coleman said, noting that is not uncommon for children to do.
“Unfortunately, the investigator was listening to that and not actually looking at the physical evidence and giving it the proper weight.”
Kaiser has been frustrated by the response. Child welfare officials have pointed to behavioral problems as a reason, she said.
The boy was taking medication for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, the DCF report says.
“Once DCF realized they had screwed up, they didn’t just say, ‘Wow we screwed up,’ but they just tried to keep covering it up,” Kaiser said.
Coleman said the way the case was handled factored into policy changes.
Investigators can no longer ask for an exception for a mandatory interview with a child protection team, she said, as Smith did for a second report of the stepmother grabbing the child’s neck in January.
“This pretty much gets another set of eyes on the case,” Coleman said.
The team is run by an organization independent of DCF, and conducts detailed interviews to try to ferret out the truth.
Smith asked for the exception because he said there were no signs of injury and the child recanted, the DCF review says.
The agency also will do deeper research into a family’s abuse history and look for patterns that stretch to the present, Coleman said.
Still, she said, the system is not failure proof.
“We are taking steps but unfortunately, we will continue to miss things,” she said. “We can always improve and we always need to improve.”
Signs of abuse
When the crime scene technician found the 10-year-old under the sink, he emerged looking scared and malnourished, say records that also provided this information:
The 10-year-old said his stepmother hit, scratched and threw him, along with forcing him to eat a piece of cloth with feces.
At times, he was made to stand in the corner with his arms up for days.
In the morning, he was allowed a slug of water and, at night, a peanut butter sandwich he sometimes hid under his mattress for when he was really hungry.
The boy told authorities he had been locked in his room since December, only leaving for school or when his family was gone.
The couple didn’t dispute much of what he said, according to reports. Kimberly Boone said she kept the door locked from 9 p.m. to the morning.
Thomas Boone told detectives his son could come out. Keeping him in the room was punishment for lying, he said.
The couple moved out of the white house with green trim after their arrests, said landlord Phillip Heyden.
The Boones told him the boy would run away at night, and they were in counseling.
“They seemed to be nice people, and it turned into a nightmare for them,” Heyden said.
His wish list
The evening the 10-year-old was removed, before going to bed in the cozy guest room of his grandmother’s condo, he scribbled out two lists.
Things he wanted to get included: “few bags of marshmellows, few boxes of gramcrackers.”
On his to-do list was: “roast marshmellows, go shoping ... go to the park for a few minuts, draw.”
He has asked to see his father, and told detectives he loved him, court records show. His father’s attorney has asked a no-contact order be lifted, which was denied.
The boy’s drawings no longer depict suicide; they feature airplanes. He recently told his grandmother he no longer thinks about his stepmother every day. That’s probably a good thing, she told him.
“There will be remnants of this forever, but he’s got a real capability for solving problems,” Kaiser said. “He’s like a little man in a 10-year-old body.”
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Primary caretaker dad jailed for assault on 2-month-old daughter (Kingston, Ontario, Canada)
Everybody expects this kind of result with the unemployed/unemployable felon dads drafted into babysitting while Mom works.
But in this case, UNNAMED DAD was (presumably) chosen to be the stay-at-home/primary caretaker parent while Mom ran a business. (However, note that Dad had a spotty work history, so there may not have been much real choice here.) Dad was also far from an illiterate idiot, as he had two university degrees.
But the results were exactly the same as with the unemployed abuser/losers. Poor Daddy got "frustrated" with the baby's crying, so he fractured her skull, ankles, and ribs, and left this little two-month-old infant with a brain injury. Now Daddy has pleaded guilty to aggravated assault, and has been sentenced to 3 years in prison.
The idea that any father, or even most fathers, can easily assume a mother's role is a myth. This is why these kinds of injuries have skyrocketed. Too many desperate moms are trying to earn the bacon, fry the bacon, and scour the frying pan afterwards. Since so many men either can't or won't find paid employment, moms have tried to compromise by pushing them into child care (or "choosing" for them to do child care). In way too many cases, it just doesn't work.
Posted 3 hours ago
A 42-year-old former divinity student who, frustrated with his infant child's crying, fractured her skull, ankles and ribs and left her with a brain injury, has been sentenced to three years in penitentiary.
The man, who moved out of Kingston to the Toronto area after he was charged in 2008, pleaded guilty in Kingston's Ontario Court of Justice last October, to an aggravated assault on his infant daughter when she was two months old. His sentencing was put over until last week, however, to allow for the preparation of a pre-sentence report and various assessments.
In pronouncing sentence, Justice Rommel Masse observed that the principals of denunciation and deterrence were paramount, given the vulnerability of the victim but under the terms of a publication ban previously imposed by the judge to protect the child's identity, her abuser's name can't be published, either.
Masse observed, in his reasons for sentence, that the man had a happy and privileged upbringing. He was well-educated and earned two university degrees prior to his marriage, although his work history was largely as a server in the hospitality industry and he frequently changed jobs.
At the time the man entered his pleas, Masse was told that following the birth of their child, he and his wife agreed that he would stay at home and look after the baby, while she ran a business.
Assistant Crown attorney Laurie Lacelle described the regular routine they developed after the baby's mother returned to work following the birth: each day, she said, the child's father would bring her to her mother for a mid-day feeding.
One day, early in the summer of 2008, however, he didn't do that, initially explaining the departure from routine to his wife with a claim that their child was cranky and fussing.
By the time her mother saw the child later that day lying listless in her swing, Lacelle said the infant was displaying flu-like symptoms, with fever, pale skin and occasional vomiting. Her condition worsened as the day wore on, until her mother made a decision to take her to a walk-in clinic.
There, the infant started screaming almost from the moment they arrived, the judge was told. Her mother at first thought she was hungry. But Lacelle told Masse the baby had no interest in food and began to convulse soon after she was placed on the examination table.
She was transferred to hospital, where Lacelle said she had to be treated for multiple seizures through the night and an initial examination revealed suspicious bruising and what police later described as "significant unexplained injuries."
As the nature of those injuries came to light, the judge was told the child's father came up with an explanation, claiming he'd been bathing his daughter in the kitchen sink when she slipped out of his grasp.
A battery of sophisticated medical tests disclosed that the extent of the girl's injuries went far beyond anything such a fall could have caused, however. Lacelle said they included retinal hemorrhages, fractures on both sides of the baby's skull, significant brain injury, healed rib fractures and broken ankles.
She told the judge the leader of the suspected child abuse and neglect team at Kingston General Hospital didn't believe the father's account and found the child's broken ankles particularly suspicious.
Additionally, she said the doctor was convinced the infant's fractured skull could only have resulted from either separate blows to both sides of her head or forceful compression on both sides of her head at once. Some of the damage spoke to earlier incidents of abuse.
Later, the baby's mother recalled other occasions when her child was injured -- suspiciously, with the clarity of hindsight-- in her father's care but Lacelle said he'd always had an explanation handy.
In one instance, after leaving them alone together in the family vehicle, Lacelle said the woman recalled her husband telling her their daughter had banged her head on the car's dashboard. She subsequently developed two black eyes.
On another occasion, he'd claimed she'd slipped from his arms as he held her in a rocking chair.
Two days after she was admitted to hospital, however, the man confessed to police that he'd struck his child in the head with the flat of his hand, spanked her on at least one occasion and punched her in the shoulder on another, out of frustration because he couldn't make her stop crying.
He also suggested that he might have broken the infant's ankles in an attempt to hold her on his shoulders and admitted that she got her black eyes that day in the car when he struck her, again for crying, and not from lurching face first into the dashboard.
He told them his wife never knew what he'd done.
The man's defence lawyer, Dave Crowe, tried to keep his client out of prison. He urged a sentence of no more than two years, in consideration of his client's lack of previous record and determination "to offer himself as a contributing member of society."
He asked Masse to consider a conditional sentence in the community with house arrest and a lengthy period of probation.
Crowe told Masse that his client has a history of Attention Deficit Disorder and was not taking his medications when he committed the crime. He argued that the abuse was completely out of character and observed that at least one doctor, who conducted a psychological assessment of the man, had suggested his behaviour may have resulted from fatigue exacerbated by his untreated ADD.
Crowe also suggested that inconsistencies in his clients' accounts of his daughter's injuries weren't deceit so much as the result of "selective dissociative amnesia."
Lacelle urged a three-to four-year prison sentence on the judge and argued "a more appropriate sentence, on the facts, is four years," adding "the facts here, sir, are simply horrifying."
She told the judge the baby's injuries were not caused by her father "having one bad day.
"This was a man who had known about his power and his risk to injure his daughter and he did nothing about it."
After he'd so seriously hurt his child, Lacelle said, he didn't take her for medical treatment or even to be comforted in her mother's arms.
"He consciously articulated the risks to himself in doing something for (his child) because he was concerned about going to jail," the prosecutor told the judge.
"He was feeling frightened. He was afraid of losing everything," and while that may be an understandable human emotion, she argued, "what he did was prioritize his own interests above his daughter's and he owed her more than that."
Though he lied to doctors for two days about how his child acquired her injuries, "it may be that there's nothing more that medical staff would have done, had they known what happened to her," Lascelle said, "but it doesn't speak well to his character."
Masse noted that the man's marriage has ended and his wife has filed for divorce.
His wife is now dealing with feelings of guilt and betrayal, according to the judge, and is also facing the prospect of raising a child at risk for epilepsy and learning disabilities.
He observed that the little girl failed to reach many of her "developmental milestones" in the first year after her hospitalization and continues to suffer from seizures, although her speech and vision appear to be developing normally.
Still, the prognosis for recovery from her brain injury remains guarded.
The judge accepted that "it is possible that (the child's father) would not have committed this offence had he been taking his medications," and he enumerated a long list of factors mitigating on the man's behalf, including substantial support from friends and family.
On the other hand, Masse said he also had to consider that the injuries inflicted were severe, the victim most vulnerable, the assaults repetitive and the man tried to cover up what he'd done.
"I can accept that his offence was reactive, but not that it was not deliberate," Masse said.
But in this case, UNNAMED DAD was (presumably) chosen to be the stay-at-home/primary caretaker parent while Mom ran a business. (However, note that Dad had a spotty work history, so there may not have been much real choice here.) Dad was also far from an illiterate idiot, as he had two university degrees.
But the results were exactly the same as with the unemployed abuser/losers. Poor Daddy got "frustrated" with the baby's crying, so he fractured her skull, ankles, and ribs, and left this little two-month-old infant with a brain injury. Now Daddy has pleaded guilty to aggravated assault, and has been sentenced to 3 years in prison.
The idea that any father, or even most fathers, can easily assume a mother's role is a myth. This is why these kinds of injuries have skyrocketed. Too many desperate moms are trying to earn the bacon, fry the bacon, and scour the frying pan afterwards. Since so many men either can't or won't find paid employment, moms have tried to compromise by pushing them into child care (or "choosing" for them to do child care). In way too many cases, it just doesn't work.
http://www.thewhig.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2591986
Father jailed for attack on infant daughter
Posted By SUE YANAGISAWA, THE WHIG-STANDARDPosted 3 hours ago
A 42-year-old former divinity student who, frustrated with his infant child's crying, fractured her skull, ankles and ribs and left her with a brain injury, has been sentenced to three years in penitentiary.
The man, who moved out of Kingston to the Toronto area after he was charged in 2008, pleaded guilty in Kingston's Ontario Court of Justice last October, to an aggravated assault on his infant daughter when she was two months old. His sentencing was put over until last week, however, to allow for the preparation of a pre-sentence report and various assessments.
In pronouncing sentence, Justice Rommel Masse observed that the principals of denunciation and deterrence were paramount, given the vulnerability of the victim but under the terms of a publication ban previously imposed by the judge to protect the child's identity, her abuser's name can't be published, either.
Masse observed, in his reasons for sentence, that the man had a happy and privileged upbringing. He was well-educated and earned two university degrees prior to his marriage, although his work history was largely as a server in the hospitality industry and he frequently changed jobs.
At the time the man entered his pleas, Masse was told that following the birth of their child, he and his wife agreed that he would stay at home and look after the baby, while she ran a business.
Assistant Crown attorney Laurie Lacelle described the regular routine they developed after the baby's mother returned to work following the birth: each day, she said, the child's father would bring her to her mother for a mid-day feeding.
One day, early in the summer of 2008, however, he didn't do that, initially explaining the departure from routine to his wife with a claim that their child was cranky and fussing.
By the time her mother saw the child later that day lying listless in her swing, Lacelle said the infant was displaying flu-like symptoms, with fever, pale skin and occasional vomiting. Her condition worsened as the day wore on, until her mother made a decision to take her to a walk-in clinic.
There, the infant started screaming almost from the moment they arrived, the judge was told. Her mother at first thought she was hungry. But Lacelle told Masse the baby had no interest in food and began to convulse soon after she was placed on the examination table.
She was transferred to hospital, where Lacelle said she had to be treated for multiple seizures through the night and an initial examination revealed suspicious bruising and what police later described as "significant unexplained injuries."
As the nature of those injuries came to light, the judge was told the child's father came up with an explanation, claiming he'd been bathing his daughter in the kitchen sink when she slipped out of his grasp.
A battery of sophisticated medical tests disclosed that the extent of the girl's injuries went far beyond anything such a fall could have caused, however. Lacelle said they included retinal hemorrhages, fractures on both sides of the baby's skull, significant brain injury, healed rib fractures and broken ankles.
She told the judge the leader of the suspected child abuse and neglect team at Kingston General Hospital didn't believe the father's account and found the child's broken ankles particularly suspicious.
Additionally, she said the doctor was convinced the infant's fractured skull could only have resulted from either separate blows to both sides of her head or forceful compression on both sides of her head at once. Some of the damage spoke to earlier incidents of abuse.
Later, the baby's mother recalled other occasions when her child was injured -- suspiciously, with the clarity of hindsight-- in her father's care but Lacelle said he'd always had an explanation handy.
In one instance, after leaving them alone together in the family vehicle, Lacelle said the woman recalled her husband telling her their daughter had banged her head on the car's dashboard. She subsequently developed two black eyes.
On another occasion, he'd claimed she'd slipped from his arms as he held her in a rocking chair.
Two days after she was admitted to hospital, however, the man confessed to police that he'd struck his child in the head with the flat of his hand, spanked her on at least one occasion and punched her in the shoulder on another, out of frustration because he couldn't make her stop crying.
He also suggested that he might have broken the infant's ankles in an attempt to hold her on his shoulders and admitted that she got her black eyes that day in the car when he struck her, again for crying, and not from lurching face first into the dashboard.
He told them his wife never knew what he'd done.
The man's defence lawyer, Dave Crowe, tried to keep his client out of prison. He urged a sentence of no more than two years, in consideration of his client's lack of previous record and determination "to offer himself as a contributing member of society."
He asked Masse to consider a conditional sentence in the community with house arrest and a lengthy period of probation.
Crowe told Masse that his client has a history of Attention Deficit Disorder and was not taking his medications when he committed the crime. He argued that the abuse was completely out of character and observed that at least one doctor, who conducted a psychological assessment of the man, had suggested his behaviour may have resulted from fatigue exacerbated by his untreated ADD.
Crowe also suggested that inconsistencies in his clients' accounts of his daughter's injuries weren't deceit so much as the result of "selective dissociative amnesia."
Lacelle urged a three-to four-year prison sentence on the judge and argued "a more appropriate sentence, on the facts, is four years," adding "the facts here, sir, are simply horrifying."
She told the judge the baby's injuries were not caused by her father "having one bad day.
"This was a man who had known about his power and his risk to injure his daughter and he did nothing about it."
After he'd so seriously hurt his child, Lacelle said, he didn't take her for medical treatment or even to be comforted in her mother's arms.
"He consciously articulated the risks to himself in doing something for (his child) because he was concerned about going to jail," the prosecutor told the judge.
"He was feeling frightened. He was afraid of losing everything," and while that may be an understandable human emotion, she argued, "what he did was prioritize his own interests above his daughter's and he owed her more than that."
Though he lied to doctors for two days about how his child acquired her injuries, "it may be that there's nothing more that medical staff would have done, had they known what happened to her," Lascelle said, "but it doesn't speak well to his character."
Masse noted that the man's marriage has ended and his wife has filed for divorce.
His wife is now dealing with feelings of guilt and betrayal, according to the judge, and is also facing the prospect of raising a child at risk for epilepsy and learning disabilities.
He observed that the little girl failed to reach many of her "developmental milestones" in the first year after her hospitalization and continues to suffer from seizures, although her speech and vision appear to be developing normally.
Still, the prognosis for recovery from her brain injury remains guarded.
The judge accepted that "it is possible that (the child's father) would not have committed this offence had he been taking his medications," and he enumerated a long list of factors mitigating on the man's behalf, including substantial support from friends and family.
On the other hand, Masse said he also had to consider that the injuries inflicted were severe, the victim most vulnerable, the assaults repetitive and the man tried to cover up what he'd done.
"I can accept that his offence was reactive, but not that it was not deliberate," Masse said.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Dad charged with breaking ribs, arm of 3-month-old son; tells police wasn't ready for the "baby thing" (Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin)
Dad MATTHEW HYKE has been jailed on 3 counts of physical abuse of a child. The 3-month-old baby had bleeding on the brain, a left rib fracture that was at least 10 days old, and a fractured arm that was at least 2 weeks old. OF COURSE, dad inflicted all this abuse while Mom was at work. I assume that means that Dad doesn't work (or at least not much)? Dad blames his attention deficit disorder (ADD), his "anger" issues, drinking (indirectly), and the fact that he wasn't ready for the "baby thing" (poor little dear). The paternal grandmother thinks all of it was just "an accident." Of Course. Even though Dad admits he raised the baby above his head and slammed him down on the bed.
Reason #1,073 on why moms need decent maternity leaves and nitwits like this need to get a job or move on.
http://www.nbc15.com/news/headlines/80442692.html
Fort Atkinson Man Charged With Child Abuse
The man told police he wasn't ready for the "baby thing" after allegedly breaking his son's arm and rib.
Reporter: Zac Schultz
Posted Thursday, December 31, 2009 -- 4:53pm
By Zac Schultz
Fort Atkinson: On December 18, Matthew Hyke's three-month-old son stopped breathing and was rushed to the hospital. At first Hyke said the child had just bumped his head on a baby monitor. His mother, Sue Wendling, believed him. "Matthew had said that it was an accident and I believed him."
Doctors found bleeding on the child's brain, a fracture to his left rib that was at least 10 days old and a fractured arm that was at least two weeks old. Dr. Barbara Knox said the baby's injuries were "definite abuse...no question."
Ten days later, Matthew told police he had a "meltdown" and admitted he raised his son above his head and slammed him down on the bed.
Hyke has been charged with three counts of physical abuse of a child. According to a criminal complaint, the 21-year-old Hyke told police he wasn't ready for the "baby thing."
His mother lives across the parking lot in Fort Atkinson. "He's been going to a psychiatrist for his anger and ADD. But this is not what I expected of him. I thought at least he'd come to me for help."
Terri Smyth-Magnus works with Jefferson County Human Services as the Child and Family Services Division Manager. She can't comment on this case, but says many young parents don't know how to cope with a new child. "We see young parents also really struggling with this, just not knowing how to function daily; go to work, take care of their child, be in a relationship."
In this case the baby's 19-year-old mother was at work when the abuse happened.
Smyth-Magnus says abuse is not something others can predict. "Often when babies are shaken or seriously injured it's a situation that just flares."
Despite the baby's injuries, Sue says he's doing fine, and should be coming home to his mother soon. "No more bleeding on the head or nothing like that."
He had been in the custody of child protective services, but Sue says the mother passed the requirements to get her child back. "(She) has to be not drinking. None in the house. There has to be no drinking, and then (the mother) gets the baby home."
Matthew Hyke remains jailed on a $10,000 cash bond.
Reason #1,073 on why moms need decent maternity leaves and nitwits like this need to get a job or move on.
http://www.nbc15.com/news/headlines/80442692.html
Fort Atkinson Man Charged With Child Abuse
The man told police he wasn't ready for the "baby thing" after allegedly breaking his son's arm and rib.
Reporter: Zac Schultz
Posted Thursday, December 31, 2009 -- 4:53pm
By Zac Schultz
Fort Atkinson: On December 18, Matthew Hyke's three-month-old son stopped breathing and was rushed to the hospital. At first Hyke said the child had just bumped his head on a baby monitor. His mother, Sue Wendling, believed him. "Matthew had said that it was an accident and I believed him."
Doctors found bleeding on the child's brain, a fracture to his left rib that was at least 10 days old and a fractured arm that was at least two weeks old. Dr. Barbara Knox said the baby's injuries were "definite abuse...no question."
Ten days later, Matthew told police he had a "meltdown" and admitted he raised his son above his head and slammed him down on the bed.
Hyke has been charged with three counts of physical abuse of a child. According to a criminal complaint, the 21-year-old Hyke told police he wasn't ready for the "baby thing."
His mother lives across the parking lot in Fort Atkinson. "He's been going to a psychiatrist for his anger and ADD. But this is not what I expected of him. I thought at least he'd come to me for help."
Terri Smyth-Magnus works with Jefferson County Human Services as the Child and Family Services Division Manager. She can't comment on this case, but says many young parents don't know how to cope with a new child. "We see young parents also really struggling with this, just not knowing how to function daily; go to work, take care of their child, be in a relationship."
In this case the baby's 19-year-old mother was at work when the abuse happened.
Smyth-Magnus says abuse is not something others can predict. "Often when babies are shaken or seriously injured it's a situation that just flares."
Despite the baby's injuries, Sue says he's doing fine, and should be coming home to his mother soon. "No more bleeding on the head or nothing like that."
He had been in the custody of child protective services, but Sue says the mother passed the requirements to get her child back. "(She) has to be not drinking. None in the house. There has to be no drinking, and then (the mother) gets the baby home."
Matthew Hyke remains jailed on a $10,000 cash bond.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)